does to donald trump. >> huh? >> well, mitt romney is a basically small business guy. i mean, my net worth is many, many, many times mitt romney. >> didn't donald trump say he liked all the potential g.o.p. candidates? he'll be joining us live. to bei "fox & friends" starts right now. >> good morning, everyone. hope you had a great weekend. people down in the southeast area of our country did not. never quite seen, steve, that the map -- the weather map -- steve's back. you're the expert on that area. >> the carolinas. >> never quite seen it look like that. horrible weather. residents from the south to the east coast more very welling at their own survival this morning as deadly tornadoes ripped through their neighborhoods and their homes. take a look at this video shot at shaw university, raleigh, north carolina during one of 62 tornadoes that ripped through that state.

>> our chief meteorologist has been on the ground covering this story since friday night and joins us live in north carolina. rick, great job over the weekend, what can you tell us this morning? >> we've moved out to the eastern side of north carolina. a lot of tornadoes moved through some of those populated areas like you saw in raleigh. that's not the case here in birdie county. this is about 20,000 residents. 11 fatalities in that one county alone. there's a home behind me, there was a home behind me. you can see the porch at this point or the front steps. there was a home there and there were three people in it. their 90-year-old mother-in-law came over to their house to wait out the storm with them. the entire house is gone, moved, scattered into the woods behind there and all three of them perished in this storm. 11 fatalities in this county

alone. one of the hardest hit. the governor is going to be coming out here at 9:45 this morning to take a tour and see the situation here in colrain but a very large tornado. one of the members of the community was able to snap a picture of this tornado as it was moving in. take a look at the picture of this tornado. absolutely such a frightening sight. estimated around 1/2 mile to 3/4 mile wide. this tornado cutting through this area. a lot of farm land so potentially it doesn't hit any houses but in this case, it certainly did. yesterday, we were able to take some aerial shots of this community. and this area. and you can get kind of an idea of some of the devastation. tornado hitting these homes and completely obliterating them, breaking them into pieces and this gives you kind of an idea of it. now it's dark here at this point but we're starting to see some light on the horizon. as the sun comes, i can tell you from my eyes, i can see a number of structures that are completely gone as the sun comes up, we'll be able to show you more of that but a very scary

situation here. 11 fatalities in this one county. a county that is used to being hit by hurricanes because we're close to the coast, not used to being hit something like this. north carolina, not used to this and now they've got a very rough week ahead of them as they begin to pick up the pieces. guys? >> rick, those aerial shots, wow. talk about devastation. complete devastation. thanks so much. we'll check back in with you. >> how much notice did you have? only about an hour. a little over an hour, right? >> not much and the video we saw from shaw university there outside of raleigh, apparently the damage was so significant there at the university they said, ok, we're going to close for the rest of the semester. whatever grades you had on friday, that's your grade for the entire year. >> wow. >> that southern storm system wreaking havoc on parts of the northeast. up to four inches of rain hit lodi, new jersey, make a mess for residents there. more than six rivers in that state at flood stage level. five people including two children and a 4-month-old baby are dead after their suv flipped

off the road and sank in a canal. it happened at a national park in north carolina as well. investigators say the 24-year-old woman who was driving the car was going too fast. the deadly storms that slammed the state were reportedly not a factor. wildfires forcing hundreds out of their homes. we're talking now about west texas. more high winds expected making it it rough on firefighters today. the fires have scorched 700 acheers in the last week alone. police arrested a homeless man for starting a small fire that destroyed eight homes near austin. he was allegedly building a campfire that spun out of control. a remote controlled machine bought in to find a miner trapped underground begins friday. the miner and his brother were working 6 thousz feet below the surface when the tunnel collapsed on him. special digger will be brought under ground in pieces and put together a mile below the surface. guess what, folks? it's tax day even though it's

the 18th. you have until midnight to file your taxes. it also means the tea party is out in force today. there were rallies across the country over the weekend calling for lower taxes and smaller government. former alaska governor sarah palin leading the charge in wisconsin. and those are your headlines. >> there's a few story lines you might have to catch up on. this one is not. it's the same story that keeps on giving. we're up to five when you left. we can add two more. >> are you talking about the fact that saturday night at the miami air traffic control center where they handle the high altitude stuff for much of florida, the caribbean and a portion of the atlantic ocean, a seventh air traffic controller fell asleep on his job. >> incredible. >> he has already been suspended but this is -- this is a big problem. ray lahood, the transportation secretary was on the "fox news sunday" program yesterday and he tra addressed this issue head on. >> i've been in this job 2 1/2

years. i don't know when i've ever been madder. i'm outraged about this and i want the flying public to know we're doing everything we can, 24/7 to correct this problem. >> good! >> he doesn't sound that outraged to me, quite honestly. i don't know, when i get outraged i have a little bit bigger tone of voice. here's the changes going into effect. minimum nine hours off between shifts. that used to be only eight hours. if they came home and went to bed, they had eight hours to be back on the shift. no longer being able to shift to the unscheduled midnight shift following a day off. a lot of times they were doing that to get a three day weekend. can't do that anymore. >> the f.a.a. managers will schedule their own shift in a way to have greater coverage. you can't nap. when you have your one on one, we are allowed to nap. we have bunk beds in the green room so that's a little different. >> here's the other thing. germany and japan apparently allow these naps, 2 1/2 hours

during the shift of the worker. the study is going to come out to recommend that these air traffic controller take naps but ray lahood says he's not in favor of it. >> controllers will not be paid to take naps, chris, we're not going to allow that. we want to make sure they're well rested and we want to make sure in the workplace there's the ability for them to do their job but we're not going to be paying controllers to be napping. we're not going to do that. >> that's what's going on with your air traffic control in this country. let's talk about what's happening with the president. president of the united states will not be in the white house. he'll head off west and try to build momentum gathered perhaps amongst democrats after his 44 minute speech at george washington university. the president plans on solving our long-term economic issues especially our debt by getting those very fortunate to pay more and he's going to say it over and over again as he gets towards manifest destiny. >> rather than the deficit

reduction tour, call it the soak the rich tour. saw in that map right there, he'll start at nova just outside of washington, d.c. in northern virginia and then go out to the facebook headquarters in palo alto and the plane will levitate up towards reno, nevada, where he's not been since the campaign. of course, the president says, you know, we really need to make the people who have been very successful in this country pay more. paul ryan says that's exactly the wrong thing to do. >> raising tax rates on anybody, especially successful small businesses, slows down the economy. loses jobs and if you have lower economic growth, you have less revenues and it puts you further behind. we want more tax revenues. but we want to get it by expanding job creation. by expanding economic growth. >> i wonder how many taxpayer dollars they had to use to change the theme of the president's campaign for 2012 because no doubt, he had -- he

changed it as shared revenue type of thing from paul ryan. i mean, do you really think he was going to use this as a theme of going out to campaign for 2012 until paul ryan introduced his plan now about two weeks ago? >> two things he has to be alarmed about. gallup poll says he has a 41% approval rating. it was as high as 50 when it compromised on the lame duck session. here he said, i'm going to go with my left and i'm going to vilify paul ryan and talk about how his program looks to throw granny out of her nursing home and make everybody pay cash for their medical care who are seniors and he's starting to be somewhat polarized. on the same point, 77% of democrats support the president. it seems high. not for him. he was up closer to 90%. >> sure. >> meanwhile, speaking of presidential politics, donald trump, did you see this? a new poll came out over the weekend, donald trump is in first place with 26% followed by mike huckabee with 17% and mitt

romney at 15. i mentioned mitt romney hat 15 because the headline in "the new york post" says size matters. there's the donald. there's the dollar sign. he's talking about the fact that he's got more dough than mitt romney. watch. >> well, mitt romney is a basically small business guy if you really think about it. i mean, my net worth is many, many times mitt romney. and i don't know mitt romney. i really don't know him. so i'm not saying good or bad. i know some of the other candidates. i don't know mitt romney. >> that's interesting because i don't think many people's interpretation of mitt romney is a small business guy. he basically brought the olympics back from the brink and he's taken over some huge corporations but other than that, and run them well, by many accounts but that's interesting. that's quintessential donald trump to say something like that. we'll ask him whether or not he really believes that. >> he was with bane and company, the ceo of that

company, a hedge fund. he spun out to his own at which time he helped fund dominos pizza which is jobs and staples which also resulted in jobs so this might be an interesting little -- there might be a loggerhead. he went on a very high level. >> sure. and perhaps, it flies in the face of what mr. trump said last week on the hannity program where he was talking about how the republican -- all the top republican candidates were getting along great. >> you know, i have a problem. they've treated me so nicely. i have such a problem. everyone said such nice things. >> that was then. this is now. >> i mean, he's realizing or his people are realizing that mitt romney is the top guy right now in many of the polls so i guess the swords have come out. >> i'll tell you what, governor huckabee on friday saying listen, i've had conversation off camera with donald trump. could not be more supportive and he likes -- they like each other so that might be a -- >> right. >> a little teaming up that couldn't be --

>> interestingly enough, apparently donald trump's bosses at nbc say he's going to be back. he's not going to run for president. this is just donald being donald. we'll talk to him about that and so much more coming up. >> i just realized i fell asleep before i found out who got thrown off "celebrity apprentice" last night. >> what are you, an air traffic control sner>> you can find that up on the break. cutting taxes without raising taxes on the middle class. can it be done? tim geitner says yes but stuart varney says not so fast. >> new video from the big easy that shows what happens right before nicolas cage was arrested. ah! fiber one honey clusters cereal!

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>> all right. treasury secretary tim geitner has one way to reduce the

deficit and he says it doesn't require raising taxes on the middle class. >> if you want to extend these tax breaks for the top 2%, then either you have to ask me to go out and borrow trillions of dollars from the chinese or from foreign investors, or you have to cut as he proposes to do very, very deeply into basic benefits for seniors, the disabled, the poor. >> but hold the phone, mr. geitner, stuart varney joins us right now and says that does not add up. >> no, it does not add up. it does not add up. geitner is saying look, you can have it all. all you have to do is tax the rich. do the math, mr. treasury secretary. really, it does not add up. if you -- if you really wanted to mop up all of this overspending and this over debt. you've got to tax the rich at 88%. you have to pay 88th on the dollar of everything they make up to $350,000 and you have to tax middle america at a 63%

rate. you're not going to do that. it's not going to happen. and if you did do it, you'd wreck the economy so treasury secretary geitner's math does not add up. >> this morning in "the wall street journal" there's an editorial that talks about if while president obama is out on this tour that we detailed a moment ago, he's going to be talking about how you got to jack up the taxes on the upper class but at the same time, he's really going to have to ultimately tax the middle class to close this gigantic budget hole. >> if you want to close this budget hole that you're talking about, you've got to tax everybody. the whole lot. if all you want to do is just raise taxes, not cut spending, all you want to do is raise taxes, then the amount of tax raising you've got to do is simply phenomenal. and it's not going to happen. this is bad economics. it might make good politics. after all, half of all households pay no federal income tax at all so you can preach to

that choir. you can tell them, you can have everything you ever wanted and the other half will pay for it. maybe that's good politics but it's lousy economics. >> but you also have the option, either you can raise taxes on somebody or everybody or simply cut spending. >> yes. >> on big, important programs. >> of course. look, that's what's required. isn't it? this is not -- i don't think this is a revenue and a tax problem. this is a spending problem. >> absolutely. >> we have spent ourselves into a $1.6 trillion deficit this year. we've got to cut that spending to get out of that hole. we show no signs of doing it. that creates a debt crisis and we're in it. >> all right. stuart varney is going to be on the fox business network at 9:20 this morning. who is your guest? >> talking about the gas price spike. it continues. $4 a gallon in six states. $4.20 in california. big deal. >> my gas station has a loan officer at it. >> second mortgage? >> that's right. thanks, stu. >> thank you. >> straight ahead, donald trump says we screwed up big time iraq. we should have gotten aur

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>> 22 minutes after the top of the hour. you can add new york to the growing list of places with gas averaging $4 a gallon. new york joins california, alaska, hawaii, illinois, connecticut and washington, d.c. and holy week begins for

christians around the world this week. the pope celebrated palm sunday mass yesterday in st. peter's square. faithful remembered jesus' crucifixion on good friday and his resurrection coming up this easter sunday. brian? >> all right. gretch, donald trump says we shouldn't be leaving iraq. we need to stay there and cash in on the oil. >> so i said very simply, that if it's me, we take the oil. you know in the old days when you win a country, you win a country. now with our stupid people, we win a country, we lose money. we lose lives. we lose soldiers and then we leave. >> napolean, alexander the great, seems to work for them. is trump right? joining us is the founder and bureau chief for iraqi oil report, ben landau and former press advisor for the coalition authority, thomas cosilli. why don't we cut a deal to for a percentage of their oil to get paid back for liberating their country? >> donald trump is a smart guy and he knows we're not going to

go back in there and grab the oil. we're not an imperialist nation. he knows that. that's not what the mission was all about. but he's looking at the gas prices and he's saying what a lot of americans are feeling. that we should be getting some sort of economic benefit for all of the blood, treasure and time that we have put into liberating that country. >> ben, you know saddam was starving his own people, using all that revenue to make -- build more palaces and that elite class. now that we balance things out, why couldn't we do what trump says? >> well, most and basic fundamentals as an american entrepreneur in iraq right now, as the owner of a news organization whose co-readership are the investors and potential investors in iraq, what he is saying frankly scares me. it increases the instability in the street. and it creates -- it feeds into the conspiracy theory that we are there for the oil. and it creates more potential for violence and risk for me, for other americans and foreigners who are living and

working in iraq and the fact that donald trump thinks this is actually a possibility shows that he really does not know too much about iraq. >> thomas, how about this? i think something people are concerned about is iran's influence growing and possibly revenue going their direction. trump did talk about that later, thomas. that's true. >> absolutely. and donald is absolutely right about this. you need to have a force there to serve as a deterrence against iran. the iranians have been killing our troops for years over there. the extremists are being funded by iran and when i was on the ground, people would say that the extremists were just biding their time and waiting for a withdrawal. it will be important for us to maintain a presence there and i think that we're seeing the administration start to shift a little bit on maintaining some sort of permanent presence. >> what do you think, ben? >> the only thing that increasing the presence and reoccupying the country is going to do is to reinvigorate the people who want to attack the

united states. >> presideence, not occupation. >> presence. >> let him finish. >> going back into iraq and securing the oil. donald trump said this. his quotes before many times is going back in there and whatever it is. whatever you want to call it, it's only going to reinvigorate the iranians, people who are against the united states and think we were there for a long-term presence and now listen, now the important thing is that donald trump has never been to iraq. thomas was there in the heady days of 2003 lounging by the pool. i lived there. i lived there for three years. >> big resort location. >> amongst the iraqis and it's a different situation. they don't know what they're talking about. >> there and aruba, those two places we're really bustling. thanks so much. we'll see if donald trump is right. if it resonates with the people. we'll find out. straight ahead, rescued from beneath the rubble up next, the youngest and smallest survivors

from this week's tornadoes. do you know that nearly half of americans don't pay federal taxes today and it's perfectly legal? so what's the other half doing differently? and the video doesn't lie. what nicolas cage was doing in this tattoo parlor right before his drunken arrest. pooches and puppies, we are fed up with being fed on. we demand k9 advantix ii. it not only kills fleas and ticks, it repels most ticks before they can attach and snack on us. frontline plus kills but doesn't repel. any tick that isn't repelled or killed may attach and make a meal of us. so let's put our paws down in protest. no fetching, no friendship till we all get k9 advantix ii. join us at poochprotest.com.

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>> extreme weather indeed. powerful storms ripped across the south this weekend leaving at least 45 people dead in six states. take a look at some amazing video that captures just how fast one tornado blew right through wilton, north carolina. look at that. let's go to our chief meteorologist rick who is live in colrain, north carolina. >> good morning, guys. we're on the eastern side, kind of much closer to the ocean, a place that gets hurricanes, typically not tornadoes but absolute devastation here and devastation across so many areas as you were saying, steve, six states experiencing fatalities. yesterday, i was in a town in north carolina that had the loews home improvement store that was destroyed. some good stories coming out in some cases, though, of survival

and take a look at this video that we have three puppies that were found under neath the wreckage and they find these little guys surviving yesterday so there's kind of great news believe naming those dogs, they think it's lucky, miracle and i can't remember what the other third name was but three amazing survival stories coming out of north carolina. now, here in a very sparsely populated county and there's been a lot of fatalities. 11 fatalities in this one county alone. three of those were people in this structure behind me here. you can see the little front steps. that was a home where a couple who have lived there for 27 years, the home completely lifted off that foundation and scattered across the woods. you can see the debris across this area. this tornado, very large tornado. one of the neighbors were able to snap a picture of this tornado as it was coming across the field. take a look at this picture, gives you an idea of how large

it was. 1/2 mile to 3/4 wide is what they're estimating. likely f-3 tornado. haven't had confirmation of how big this tornado is. in the state of north carolina, there was five tornadoes as far as the rating so far and 10 of the tornadoes that we've seen across the country over the last three days were f-3 tornadoes. winds around 136 to 160 miles an hour. destroying anything in its path. certainly the case with this tornado, very wide tornado. you can see throughout the fields here and throughout the woods, all of the trees completely snapped off. and it goes for a very large area. so a lot of devastation here, people trying to figure out exactly how to pick up the pieces. power is still out, obviously. hope to have the power back on by tomorrow. schools back on by tomorrow and later on this morning, the governor will be touring this community that was so hard hit as well. guys? >> all right, rick reporting live from north carolina where they continue to pick up the pieces.

thank you sir. >> you know what today is, april 18th. you say it isn't tax day. it is tax day. washington observed emancipation day on the 15th. you have a little reprieve. we'll break down some of the numbers for you this morning. you might be surprised to know that 45% of all u.s. households will pay no federal income tax today when they go to file. >> that's incredible to me because if you look at the president's speech last night, you would think the only problem with revenue is that the fortunate ones, those people who inherited the money or got really lucky, they're not paying enough. maybe the problem is that half the country doesn't pay enough. >> yeah. >> pay anything! >> sure, there's so -- well, with federal taxes they do pay state taxes and all that other stuff as well. because there's so many breaks at the federal level, tax breaks, people -- 45% don't pay that. now, as high as our taxes are right now, guess what the top marginal tax rate was when john kennedy was president. >> don't know. >> 91%.

>> that is so scary. >> it's 91%. and -- >> that was the eisenhower years but he transitioned out of that. >> right, it continued on. i think it was a 91% rate through 1963. the marginal tax rate at the top was 94%. for the top wage earners in this country. >> actually -- >> can you imagine? >> to be fair and balanced, the richest people in america are paying less taxes if you equate it with time as well. they paid -- the 400 highest income earners averaged $345 million. they paid 17% tax down from 26% in 1992 so it appears to be doing this and then that brings you back to the argument of eventually you have to go to the middle class to try to make up all the revenue if you want to go along with the president's plan. >> that's why both sides agree there should be tax reform and they should find a way to go on that rather than saying these are the bad guys. these are the good guys and that's where i thought we were heading into that speech last

week. >> i want to know about the perks today. you can get write-off perks when you do your taxes. did you know you also can get food? i'm into this like maggie moos because it's tax day. and then cinnabon, two free cinnamon bites between 6:00 p.m. and 8:00 p.m. >> which is good. if you go there to get two free bites, you'll have more than that. something about the sugar. >> at brueggars, you get a bakers dozen bagels plus two tubbs of cream cheese for $10.40, get it, if you clip the coupon off facebook and at california tortilla free chips and cheese or salsa any time today with a purchase. speaking of meals -- >> p.f. chang's offers 15% discount. entrees and bar specials $10.40. and ihop which, by the way, have you seen an empty parking lot of ihop? 24 hours a day. kids under the age of 12 and how many different flavors are there

for syrup. eat for free with parents purchasing an adult entree. here's the thing, can i ask you -- i don't mean to put you on the spot but next year as our special, maybe we could offer individually to do somebody's taxes. they can mail in their tax receipts. we can grab a meal. >> you would need to become a cpa between now and then. because most people cannot do their own taxes. >> no, we don't have to do them well. just do them. right? >> you would impose an audit on the person that would win your prize ooch prize. >> that's a show. ongoing thing. >> it would have to be the 1040ez where there's no itemization. it's pretty much -- >> so easy for tim geitner. if he can do it, we can do it. >> he didn't do it well. >> there goes my theory. the f.a.a. putting new rules in place for air traffic controllers today after seven of them were caught asleep at the job. they're all out at jackson hartsfield airport.

we find daryl carver of our affiliate. hey there. >> they chose hartsfield jackson because it is the world's busiest airport. you're talking about an airport that's the hub for both airtran and delta. and the place where a lot of folks no doubt will be concerned about all of these air traffic controllers that were found sleeping on the job. those air traffic controllers were at airports in reno, washington, d.c., knoxville, seattle and the most recent one was in miami. the concern now is this -- allowing those air traffic controllers to have enough sleep, enough rest before they even get to the job. the biggest change that's being implemented in this plan is to give them an additional hour of sleep -- hour of rest, hour of time away from the job before they come in to work their shift to try to ensure that they're fresh at the start of those shifts. that would be the biggest change that will be announced today by f.a.a. administrator randy babbitt when he speaks to those

air traffic controllers. we understand that's supposed to happen sometime around 11:00 this morning out here at hartsfield jackson. >> all right, darryl. good job. thanks for the roundup. it's a big airport. you'll have to take the shuttle to get around. that's why i know it's big. >> we want to bring you the latest on libya now. qaddafi's forces are bombarding rebel-held cities on either side of the country. in the west, qaddafi troops are blasting the city with rockets and grenades. the fierce fighting has left 17 people dead. dozens more hurt and move to the eastern side of libya, qaddafi forces pounding the city. meantime, the u.s. has reached an agreement to provide aid to people in tripoli. what happened with that war? are we still involved? >> i think so, kind of. 21 minutes before the top of the hour. outpouring of love and support outside a tennessee church where a community prayed for the missing nursing student, holly bobo.

>> the pastor calling for her safe return. >> there's a big hurting in our heart because we don't know where she is and we don't know what she's going through but we're not going to quit looking. and we're not going to quit searching until we find her. >> well, search efforts are intensifying but still, no sign of the 20-year-old. >> meanwhile, after getting arrested in new orleans, nicolas cage's friends reportedly want the actor to check into rehab and this morning, we're getting a first look at what happened in the moments before he was busted for being drunk and abusive allegedly. tmz releasing surveillance video from a tattoo parlor. it shows cage arguing with some people including his wife. word is he was so liquored up, he couldn't find his way home and that's when he allegedly grabbed his wife's arm, pulling her towards the wrong house. >> oh, boy! >> let's talk a little sports because the nba in full swing,

brian. >> great day for the nba yesterday. >> playoffs in full swing as you mentioned and already there are major upsets in game one. let's go to the west coast. the san antonio spurs went down to the memphis grizzlies. hits the big shot for memphis. first playoff win ever for the grizzlies, made after a bear. made sense when they were in canada. the defending champion lakers were stunned by chris paul and the hornets win. game two is wednesday night. new york knicks i thought i'd be reporting on an upset here making their first playoff appearance since 2004. they face the celtics in boston. knicks had the lead. celtics came roaring back and then ray allen, you left him open, didn't you? boston went up 87-85. knicks with one last shot. caramelo anthony would pull up, take the three. he was 1-11 of the second half. that wasn't the one. and finally a thrilling finish to the sprint cup race in

talladega. eight cars had a chance to win it. it would be jimmie johnson edging out chris border by 1/100th of a second, matches the closest finish ever in the history. he has dale earnhardt jr. to thank. he gave him a big push at the end. that's a quick look at what happened in the world of sports. >> from sports to salt, what's coming up on the radio show? >> a lot of stuff. in fact, gretchen carlson will be joining me quick and we have -- >> another athat will be joining us this hour and about five other guests. >> fantastic. hold the salt, one of america's largest fast food chains slashing the salt. we'll tell you which one shortly. >> and the president's so-called panel are supposed to come up with a way to slash the budget. are they a way for the president to buy more time? the interesting debate is next. we wiped the slate clean.

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>> 45 minutes after the top of the hour. thanks for sharing your time again today. senator mark warner says the gang of six is close to a deal on the deficit reduction plan. is the white house rushing the commission in order to take the spotlight off the president's own plan. very interesting question. our washington insiders are here, david of the washington examiner and author of gangster government in and jim kessler, vice president for policy and the co-founder of third way. good morning, gentlemen. >> good morning. >> let me start with you. is this a deflection of the president's plan to hurry along those three democrats and three republicans as the gang of six tries to get their plan out? >> the fact that he's already pushing for this plan when there is no actual plan yet is kind of interesting. we wouldn't be having this debate at all if not for the ryan budget's release and yeah, i think pushing for somebody else's plan to be the substitute once he's already rejected what his fiscal commission did in december and distance himself from it tells you where the

president is on this right now. >> the president is now going out to the west coast. he's on the shared responsibility tour. do you think that he had that name a couple of months ago or came up with that after paul ryan introduced his plan? >> i think paul ryan got this debate started but i think it's moved a long way past the ryan budget. the gang of six budget that is bipartisan and should be coming out in the next couple of weeks, it's the only game in town. if there's going to be a major budget agreement and i'd put the chances at about 30% or 40%, it's going to look a lot like the gang of six budget so that's the direction we're heading. >> but david, weren't members of the gang of six caught off guard with the president coming out with his supposed plan? >> yeah, no, they were. and, you know, i have no idea what the gang of six is going to come up with and i don't know if president obama actually has any idea what it's going to look like either. it could be for a lot of people, it could be just as unacceptable or it could, you know, again, the plan that was already rejected in december, how much is it going to look like that?

i mean, if the question is whether the ryan budget is unfair because it puts everything on the backs of spending cuts rather than tax increases, ok, we had a plan that did tax increases, that was rejected as politically unpalatable. what's going to happen now when another plan comes out of the gang of six in already coburn and warner are saying this is going to make everyone mad. is the president going to embrace this, sight unseen? you know, i'm a little bit skeptical. >> so speaking of skeptical, jim, some people say that the president really doesn't have his charts and graphs in order for his plan yet. that it was more of a speech last week so therefore, he is kind of waiting for the gang of six and prodding them along so he can take the credit, would that be it? >> well, look, any time anything passes major, the president gets credit, whether he had a lot to do with it or not. look, here's the situation we're in. we've had record low tax rates and we've had record high spending for 10 consecutive

years and it's going to have to change. the gang of six has a plan that, yeah, it angers everybody but i think that anger is going to offset itself and, perhaps, please everybody in the aggregate and frankly, it is the only game in town. i think the president is doing the right thing. he's out there now. this is the way it's got to go and if it's not gang of six, it's going to be nothing. >> they should maybe change it from gang to compromise. good to talk with you this morning. thanks for getting up so early. >> thank you. >> he's only 2 years old. his knowledge goes back more than two centuries? >> huh? sunday, we watched him recite the president with a little help. next, wonder how these women look so good? dr. oz says he knows and he's there to share their secret to losing the pounds. that's next. >> we've got a flood. hits the road, the nose the angels start second guessing where they tread.

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>> welcome back. you may find it hard to recite the names to all of our 44 u.s. presidents but one pintsized patriot can wrap all of our american presidents in order. he did it on our program yesterday. watch. >> fantastic! 2-year-old rockford ramirez is here to show us more of his skills and joined by his proud parent parent parents,raquel and rocky ramirez along with his brother. good morning to all of you. >> good morning. >> raquel, this all started --

apparently, you had something called your baby can read it. >> yeah. we had a couple of videos that he was watching and that was some of them. he also had baby einstein. just a couple of videos that we were trying to expose him to language and to just try to prepare him. we didn't really have anything set in stone as to what to do. >> i should point out, he was perfectly mannered until he suddenly popped up on the television where he can see he's funny. all right. apparently, so does rocky. so rocky, did i read somewhere that apparently an iphone app helped him memorize stuff? >> yeah, after he started catching on to the capitals, the iphone app helped him have fun with it and learn more about it and he never wants to put the phone down now. >> your children are adorable. rockford, sit up here straight, rockford? >> ok. shhh, rocco.

>> rockford, i'm going to ask you the names of the state capitals. i'll give you a state and you tell me the capital, ok? ok? now, just look at me. that's all good. here's your first state. rockford? virginia. what is the state capital of virginia? >> rockford, what's the capital of virginia. >> richmond. >> that's correct. very good. >> texas? >> austin. >> right. >> california. >> sacramento. >> sacramento. >> florida. >> tallahassee. >> right. >> north carolina. >> raleigh. >> raleigh. that's right. alabama. >> alabama. >> what's the capital? >> alabama. >> that is the state and the capital is -- >> montgomery. >> montgomery. very good. kansas.

>> montgomery. >> no, kansas. >> that's a tough one. i'm from kansas. in fact, i used to live in -- >> topeka. >> topeka, very good! very nicely done. this is terrific. how smart are you? >> i don't know! >> well, this is great. so what's he working on now? >> well, he started trying to get the inauguration dates of the presidents so he's got a couple of those but that's what he's been working on lately. >> he thinks he's cute on tv and loves to be on camera. rocky and raquel and rockford and rocco, thank you for joining us. >> excellent job. very, very nicely done. all right. straight ahead on our program today, donald trump taking on president bush. george bush gave us obama.

>> the former press secretary for president george w. bush had something to say to the donald. dana perino here in a couple of minutes. [ female announcer ] to get fresh-baked rich, indulgent chocolaty brownies you don't have to open your oven... just the refrigerator. ready-to-eat pillsbury sweet moments. find em in the refrigerated section of your store.

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where's susie ? is she expecting you ? because they know the small business with the best technology rules. >> good morning, everyone. i'm gretchen carlson. several states declaring a state of emergency. 200 tornadoes leaving behind a path of destruction. we're live with a woman who watched the storm tear through her neighborhood. >> get ready for more new rules at an airport near you. but will more regulation give controllers to keep their eyes open or is it nap time the new normal? we'll talk about naps pro and con when we come back. >> plus it turns out donald trump had something in common with barack obama. they both have a knack for blaming bush. >> whether you like him or not, george bush gave us obama. >> dana perino will react to

that statement and attack on her former boss in a couple of minutes. "fox & friends" for a monday rolls on right now. >> good morning, everyone. hope you had a great weekend. people from the south to the east along the coast there, they had a very dire weekend. picking up the pieces this morning after deadly tornadoes ripped through their neighborhoods and their homes. 45 people were killed in six states. look at this devastating video. our chief meteorologist rick has been covering the story in colrain, north carolina with some guests. good morning, rick. >> good morning, we've been showing this picture of a tornado that was taken -- picture of the tornado that struck this area. it was taken by the burkett family, i have jean and richard here. you saw the tornado coming over the fields and you thought i'm

going to take a picture instead of i'm going to get in a safe spot. >> two days later, we wonder why we took the picture. that day, it was just so astounding, so fascinating. he hollered, where's the camera? i saw the tornado. where's the camera? >> from that amount of time of seeing it, how much time did you have to get into a safe spot? >> no more than 10 seconds i'm sure. >> the tornado went through. you have lived here your entire life. >> sure. >> you knew everybody in this small community. there were three people who perished here. you've known them. they lived right here in this home next to us. tell us what happened. you came out of your house and what did you see? >> we had run into a closet, probably a minute later, two minute later, we came out of the closet. my house is standing, my house looks good. we walked outside and started looking around the community and this is the first thing i saw. i said barbara and roy's house is gone. didn't know it was gone to the extent it's gone but we thought it was gone and we just looked around and we saw the damage

everywhere! it -- the landscaping, the structure here will never, never be the same. the loss of lives here is the one thing that we can never replace. >> how -- from the time that the tornado passed to the time that you knew that they were gone, how much time passed and how did you find out that information? >> i did not know for sure that they were gone until probably at 10:30 that night. the tornado struck around 6:30 that evening. they own a place in lake gaston, a beautiful place and they usually spent every weekend there. >> and this weekend they stayed. >> yes. >> and their mother-in-law lived next door? >> lived next door. she had been -- she's -- was 90 years old. she's been very sick this whole year. it started around christmas time and she's been very sick and she's -- every night she would come over and spend the night at the house with them. and she was in this house. >> you talked with the person

who found their bodies. >> didn't talk to the person but talked to a close friend of the person and when the bodies were found, they were still crouched down together. the three of them had their arms around each other and they were still holding each other when they were found. >> we're so sorry for the loss for your community. there's a home right there in the back. you guys were married in that home? >> yes, yes. a big two story house sitting back there. i was raised in that house and that's the home we were married in. >> and it's destroyed. >> it's destroyed. it's destroyed. a lot of memories is gone. a lot of things that will take a long time to replace but we can't replace life. >> right. you said it. all right. our thoughts and prayers are certainly with you for the next weeks and months to come. >> thank you. >> all right, guys. amazing stories of survival and of loss all here across much of the eastern seaboard, unfortunately. all right. back to you. >> we wondered who took that picture. now we know. >> can't get any closer to heart of that story. thank you very much, rick. let's do your other hetd lines for a monday now.

the f.a.a. starts implementing new rules for air traffic controllers today. this after seven recently fell asleep on the job. here's a look at the changes. they will have a minimum of nine hours off between shifts. that's a change from eight. restrictions on shift swapping as well. managers will work more early mornings and late nights and controllers will be forbidden to take naps on break time. other news, five people including two children and a 4-month-old baby are dead after their s.u.v. flipped off the road and sank in a canal. it happened at a national park in north carolina. investigators say the 24-year-old woman who was driving the car going too fast. the deadly storms that slammed that state reportedly were not a factor in this accident. i don't know if this is good news or bad news for you. it's tax day. you have until midnight to file your taxes. that's good news if you haven't started yet. the tea party is out in force today. there were rallies calling for lower taxes and smaller government. former alaska governor sarah

palin leading the charge in the state of wisconsin. she called him a bad kisser so imagine how awkward last night's reunion must have been when two of hollywood's hottest stars, robert pattinson and reese witherspoon stepped out on the red carpet for the premiere of their new movie. witherspoon shied away saying pattinson was unpleasant and probably had a cold. instead, only speaking about the film. >> i think it's a classic story that everybody can relate to the idea that sometimes you're stuck in a place in your life and you need someone to come along and throw you a rope. >> "water for elephants" hits theaters this friday. is that the vampire guy? >> yeah. no wonder, vampires are not the hottest kitcheners, are they? >> i'm not sure, steve? >> you don't want to kiss a vampire. they turn your head and next thing you know -- >> can't trust them. here's the other thing about robert pattinson. i read she played his mom in another movie and that's the

problem because i can't get over that. i mean -- >> that would be weird. >> i'm not going! >> back to fred claus. >> we promised not to talk about any of that stuff from here on out. dana, good morning to you. >> good morning. help me save this show! >> yeah, it's too late. >> let's talk about barack obama, he's down on his shared responsibility budget tour. interestingly enough, he's at a bunch -- he's going to go to states that he needs if he's going to be re-elected president of the united states. is this an official trip or is this a campaign trip which would then be paid for by his campaign? >> it depends. i started noticing this a couple of months ago where they kicked off the state of the union and the budget tours and the win the future tour but now we're on the shared responsibility future tour, i guess we're all going to have to work together to win the future. if you look at some of the states he's going to, they are the key states he's going to need to win. that includes not only the places he's traveling but where he's giving these satellite media tour interviews, you know, some of the key states that he's

going to need to win indiana, colorado, he's going to virginia quite a bit. that's a state that's closer to visit from where he is at the white house. pennsylvania is going to be a key state. and one of the things i dealt with as the white house press secretary was when we were in the campaign mode going on the campaign trip, all the reporters would ask me, then who is paying for this trip? and was it an official trip or should it been paid for by the campaign? there are complicated formulas that figure all that out. i'm surprised the press hasn't started asking those questions yet because clearly the campaign is under way. >> right. let's talk about something else, you see he has this tour going out and he's going to talk about how the rich don't pay enough. and how they're trying to balance the budget and this balance theme but overall, the president prior to that speech at george washington university, his approval rating according to gallup was 41%. that's a low for him. now, let me ask you something,

it was a high for him during the lame duck session after he cut that deal in december. he was up around 50%. so why would he go back to doing something that doesn't rate well with the general public? >> you know, i think one of the things that you could look at is there has been one key personnel change from december to now. and that is the former political advisor in the white house has moved back to chicago. ea he's working on the campaign. david plouffe is the political advisor in the white house and he was the architect of the 2008 campaign and in some ways, it does feel like wait a second, didn't we just have this debate in december and now it's settled and now we're going to have the same debate again? to me from a communications perspective, it's like from a messaging standpoint, they're trying to pound this square peg into a round hole and it's just not going to fit. >> very interesting analysis. i had not thought about the difference between axelrod and plouffe. let's move on to donald trump. he seems to be garnering a lot

of attention right now as a possible republican candidate for president. but he apparently doesn't like your former boss as much as he doesn't like the current president. listen to this. >> whether you like him or not, george bush gave us obama and i'm not happy about it. ok, i'm not happy about it. we have a disaster on our hands. we have a man right now that almost certainly will go down as the worst president in the history of the united states. at least he didn't give your former boss the worst title but he doesn't like him that much. what do you make of it? >> i think if you go back to 2008, everybody was running against george w. bush and that was part of the campaign shtick. you can go back to 2006 when speaker pelosi led the charge for the democrats to take back the house and harry reid in the senate. what i would say for donald trump is he doesn't have to run against george bush. there is plenty to complain about and criticize with the

current president and if donald trump is serious about running, one of the things he'll have to do is start the pivot. people want to know what the positive agenda would be for america and you can't always be giving some -- somebody a reason to vote against somebody else you have to give them a reason to want to vote for you. >> what do you make of the fact that in this new public policy polling poll of the top republicans, he's number one at 26% and followed by huckabee and then mitt romney? >> i'm not -- i don't know how long it will stick around, right, what is the lasting power, can he go the distance? he certainly asks some provocative questions and i think he's got so much media attention, people turn around and say hey, this might be a guy that's worth talking to. >> every time someone says what about the revenue? i'm going to go get it from china. i'm going to get it from saudi arabia. they've been ripping us off and we'll bring it back here. people like that message. most people do feel like we're being ripped off internationally.

>> right. and so he's going to have to lay out a plan to show exactly how he's going to do that. it seems a little bit -- it sounds good but realistically how would he do it? >> could he actually do it once he's president? it always seems to change. dana perino, great to get your thoughts. have a fantastic week. >> great job with chris wallace yesterday. >> thanks. >> meanwhile, straight ahead, has arnold lost his looks? making a stunning admission this morning. we'll reiterate it without the accent. >> then you've probably seen the skateboarding dog. have you met his k-9 friend, the scooter riding dog? we're putting them together on the plaza this morning. you don't want to miss this. >> oh, my gosh! what kind of dog is that? >> is that a man in a dog suit? >> it looks like it. >> harry and the hendersons. i'm phil mickelson, pro golfer.

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good job girls. i wear what i love, because expression means everything. ♪ too hot to trot some say i'm one-of-a-kind. i say i'm so chico's. >> listen to this, the f.b.i. launch blackhawk helicopters to search a stretch of beach on long island for human remains. connected to the serial killer

we've been telling you about. now, so far, 10 bodies have been found on a 3.5 mile stretch. police say the killer is highly organized and so investigators are convinced he's finished. we're joined by the nassau county executive. thanks for joining us. i understand part of the challenge, this is across two counties. suffolk, where four were found and then you have nassau where we had the remains of two others that were found including the ones of a child. how is that working? >> you know, it's multijurisdictional, it's not just nassau county but new york state has property there and the new york state park police have jurisdiction over there and now we have the f.b.i. in. it's multijurisdictional, it takes cooperation and that's what all the agencies are doing collectively. >> what's your greatest concern here? some say this is more than one killer in the act. what can you tell us? >> well, the greatest concern is there's obviously a murder out there. we're looking to bring him to

justice as quickly as possible. we're using all of our resources, our technology, our surveillance, our manpower, our k-9 unit. our horseback, helicopter, airplane, divers, everything that we have we're putting into this case to try to discover evidence that will lead to the discovery of this murderer. >> you know, you just took the job over so i mean, i don't know how much you can possibly do along with your budget crisis that's going on. if you look at the number of bodies that were found and the fact that no one goes there in the off season, can you say there is not -- it is not effectively policed at this point? and if for something like this to happen, it shows someone is taking their eye off the ball? >> well, first of all, i wouldn't blame the police at all being effectively policed. this is miles of desolate, thick, thorny area that's not even viewable by the roadway. there's some auxiliary roads in there and some paths and that's, i believe, where most of the bodies were probably discarded from.

so this is certainly not a police issue at all, you know, this is miles and miles of roadway in a desolate area and, you know, also by our famous beaches but, you know, you really have to look at the terrain. very, very difficult terrain. >> right. i think there's got to be another way for -- if for some reason these killers thought there was some way to dump bodies there. they were getting away with it. is there reasons to believe there's breaks in the case because this buffalo woman according to one of the victims has gotten a call. her family was getting calls over and over again and they were getting these calls. can you tell me about how that investigation is progressing and how that might be helping. >> i really can't comment on the status of where the police are following up all these tips. we are taking in dozens and dozen of tips. over 100 tips on our tip line 1-800-244-tips. crimestopper line and we follow each and every one of these up. it's the simple pieces of evidence that leads to apprehension of this murderer.

>> they're out there and taunting and leaving some clues along the way. we hope you're back on the air soon telling us how you got them. that would be the next goal. thanks so much for joining us now. nassau county executive. >> thank you. >> all right. 19 minutes after the hour. do you ever wonder how these women look so good? i do, all the time. dr. oz knows and he's here to share their secrets for staying trim. i'll ask him in the break. he may be tiny but this soldier in training sure is tough. meet the 7-year-old soldier who is learning the ropes alongside our troops. fiber one chewy bar.

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>> news by the numbers time, i should say. first, six much that's how many states now have $4 a gallon gas prices. that according to triple a.

new york is the newest state to join that club. we don't want to be in that club, by the way, with michigan and indiana not far behind. next 45%. that's how many households will not pay federal income tax for 2010 according to the tax policy center. the think tank says tax breaks are the primary cause and finally, $40 million. that's how much animated 3d flick "rio" raked this weekend topping in the weekend box office. >> everybody spends countless hours and money trying to lose weight, right? a never ending battle where there are always more questions than answers. >> dr. oz, the host of "the dr. oz show" appropriately enough is here to answer your toughest weight loss questions. good morning to you. >> good morning. >> these are the top five questions people seem to have. top one is you can figure out how much weight you can lose and should lose based on your blood type. >> it's about how much you should eat in order to lose weight. 2/3 of americans have a problem with weight.

if you dive into blood types, there's three types. there's type o, they would in theory eating a lot of proteins. that's what the cavemen had access to. a, the second most common is the meals with a lot of grains and the b's, adriatics, folks from that part of the world, because they're nomadic by nature would be eating a lot of low fat dairy. that's the theory. the reason i bring that up. a lot of folks might say that's not what i should figure out what i'm supposed to be. reality is we don't have any evidence that this makes a big difference. >> very interesting. >> but we do know that some folks do much, much better eating a primarily meat-based or protein based diet and cut their carbs down. >> what's the best way to lose fat and not the muscle? some people are concerned about that. >> you got to build muscle in order to be part of the equation. that means doing something to build a little bit of weight bearing exercise examiand a lot women don't do this.

they stop doing it when they grow up. you have to start doing things like squats and simple things. it's muscle mass. what you don't want to do is drink sugary soda while you're exercising. >> you touched on sugary soda. how can you stop sugar craving? when people are on a diet. they want something sweet. >> spices work. it tantalizes your mouth. >> what do you mean? you can have cinnamon. any spice. pepper would work. something else that gives you that hedonistic taste back too your tongue. if you're giving yourself sugar, that does it. sugar is very addictive. we need to cut back on that. a lot of people like to snack. eat small meals instead. you can eat lots of small meals. snacks nail you. they're often high in carbohydrat carbohydrates. >> this is a big question. people wonder when they get older, they start accumulating the belly fat. got any tips about that? >> big tip. this is a lot about hormones and cortizol. i see somebody who is stressed

out and not able to cope with it. when you have chronic stress, you elevate your cortisol levels. so your body thinks you're starving. so you will store fat in your waist area in order to avoid dying. deal with the stress in your life and you'll naturally melt away some of the belly fat. >> final question, what foods add to belly fat and which ones burn belly fat? >> inflammatory fats build it. things that melt away your belly fat include healthy fats like avocados but also you want to focus on things like green tea that have natural chemicals in them. they please you. that will be the message for today. put green tea in your life. tomorrow, i'm doing all these questions to get people to understand how easy it is to melt away the fat. >> on thursday, i believe it is, you're doing women coming home from war? >> i'm so proud of this show. historic moment in our nation. women fighting on the front lines. when they come back, they're highly acclimated and i went to visit the homeless women who are u.s. veterans and understand

what's going on in their lives. it's life changing for me. >> great to see you, dr. oz. thank you. >> take care. >> thanks for making a couch call. >> the more we spend, fatster it fails. a live report of what it's costing you. >> can arnold blame politics for letting his body go soft? uh-oh, dr. oz, you're needed on the left coast. former california governor not too happy with his health. >> and the skateboarding dog meets his match. the dog that rides a scooter. we're putting these two pooches together on the plaza. are we calling brian a pooch? >> i got to talk to the bulldog! ♪ [ male announcer ] in 2011, at&t is at work, building up our wireless network all across america. we're adding new cell sites... increasing network capacity... and making a substantial investment to improve your wireless twork experience. from a singlene call

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ow. [ male announcer ] to get the flights you want, sign up for a venture card at capitalone.com. what's in your wallet? uh, it's okay. i've played a pilot before. >> welcome back. check out this devastation. aerial video from a tornado that ripped through colrain county, north carolina. homes completely destroyed as families are ready to pick up the pieces and their lives. on the ground is our chief meteorologist for fox news. last hour you talked to that family of that was an amazing interview. what can you tell us now? >> yeah, i'll tell you, kind of stories of devastation here. people's lives completely changed or lost in some cases. this is the foundation of the home from the family who perished. you can see absolutely nothing except for the bricks. and then if you pan over to the other side, back here towards the woods, you can see all of the rubble.

everything completely shattered around. completely impossible to identify any kind of a home at this point just broken pieces of wood. people's belongings. pieces of scrap metal, bed, stuff and trees. there's a washer and dryer that are jammed way back into the trees back here. so it gives you an idea of how everything in seconds completely exploded. and was blown back into these woods. you also notice on these trees that were tall trees and they're completely shredded, completely snapped off and any kind of vegetation that was on them, any leaves or anything is completely gone. so it's such a sad and scary sight here when you look back in the distance, you can see a couple of other homes that are -- have been completely destroyed. still standing but all the windows blown out from them. paint peeled off. roofs gone. and those homes will have to be demolished. this is a small town, colrain and in kind of a line of smaller towns here that were hit. a lot of people talking about

seeing the tornado because it's fairly flat and fairly open so a lot of people got good views of the tornado as it was moving through. kind of this farm country. so now people having all these stories of seeing the tornado and seeing the devastation afterwards and how quickly everything changed in a matter of seconds likely changing for their entire lives. >> thanks very much for your coverage. now the other headlines. >> rest of the stories making news on this monday and we start out with new video out of the state of maryland. just over 20 boy scouts have just been rescued from a flooded campground in white's ferry. all the scouts are doing just fine. heavy weekend rains caused flooded rivers and streams and trapped the scouts. good news this morning, they're all ok. >> to texas where wildfires are forcing hundreds out of their homes. more high winds are expected today. that's going to make it rough on the firefighters. the flames have scorched 700,000 acres in the past week alone. police arrested a homeless man for starting a small fire that

destroyed eight homes near austin. he was allegedly building a campfire that spun out of control. >> meanwhile, subway is slashing the salt starting today. the chain restaurant will cut 28% of their salt in their fresh bit sandwiches. the rest of the sandwiches will see a 15% decrease in the salt content. the changes are in line with current government guidelines for healthy eating. >> governorator calling himself the flabanator? the former governor of california very upset he can't beat father time. the 63-year-old tells "newsweek" he's proud of his political accomplishments but bummed about the way he looks. saying "when i stand in front of the mirror and really look, i wonder what the bleep happened here? what a beating!" wow, i guess he hasn't done anything to increase his looks like plastic surgery or something like that. anyway, taxes are due at

midnight tonight so where is all of your money going? how about the department of agriculture which continues to dole out millions in farm subsidies even though the number of farmers is way down. joining us from our l.a. bureau to break it down for us is william lajunesse. you're good at that. breaking stuff down for us. >> well, you know on a day when many pay taxes, some farmers are getting money back thanks to those subsidies from capitol hill and this time, house republicans and the administration agree on some of the programs to cut. >> for decades, congress gave the iconic american farmer massive federal handouts. that may be over but not without a fight. >> we need to tackle agriculture. we cannot afford to lavish these subsidies on corporate agribusiness. >> until other farmers and other governments are willing to give up their subsidies, we're unwilling to do that. >> these programs face cuts. conservation subsidies that give farmers money to take land out of production for wildlife. direct payments to farmers and crop insurance.

>> most farmers could do away with direct payments but crop insurance is vital to our -- to the health of the industry. it's kind of a national security thing. we need to produce a good crop every year to feed the world. >> taxpayers pay insurance premiums, administrative costs and even insurance losses. critics say that's not a federal responsibility. nor should taxpayers pay corn, wheat, soybeans, peanut, rice and cotton farmers up to $40,000 a year in direct payments. whether they farm or not. >> paying farmers not to farm doesn't make any sense. and neither does giving people money just because they happened to own land where historically there have been farming like direct payment. >> so how much do these three subsidies cost you? go to foxnews.com/yourmoney. if you earn $15,000 to $30,000, it costs you $7. if you earn $50,000 to $100,000, that's going to cost you $70. you earn $100,000 to $200,000,

$400. if you make more than $250,000, your cost will be almost $2,000. now, you know, farmers will say that on their own, they can't afford crop insurance and unlike other business, one weather event can wipe them out. one key difference. while 75ers of the ag business is food stamps, the house budget would cut that. administration would not. >> looking into that one category there. >> all right. out we go to the plaza and brian kilmeade standing by with some very talented critters. >> exactly and some very talented trainers. they're the hottest dogs on the web and now on your tv. there are two legged champions and four legged champion and these stars have brought their talents to "fox & friends." joining us, the world's fastest skateboarding dog i will tillma his friend norman. and lexi is here who coordinates all of it. welcome. >> thank you so much! >> that's norman and norman is

skateboarding better than me. how? >> norman is a phenomena. he's a year and a half. and his trainer is karen and he's just incredible! >> yeah. what did you realize norman not only wanted to skate but he wanted to stand? >> you know, started playing on one of the kids' toys. they have toys and he just jumped on when he was a puppy and started playing so we took them for a ride and couldn't get him off. >> now he goes all around the country and now is going to be part of a big promotion for major league baseball. we also have another champion right here, ron davis, who have you brought? >> this is my buddy tillman. >> and tillman does what besides bite the skateboard. >> he snow boards and surfs and a bunch of the rose parade floats and a lot of commercials on tv. >> the secret to his success is biting the wheel that feeds him. let's take a look at tillman, the fastest skateboarder ever. look at this. tillman on the move.

he sees the wall. he is not chagrinned. back and forth he goes. tillman up the wall and down. and you are very confident, aren't you, because tillman never runs away. you don't have him on a leash! >> as long as he has a skateboard, it's like having his own force field. >> wow. >> ron, where do you even start training a bulldog to not only be a champion but to race like that. >> you know, i've waste the a lot of man hours and he has a lot of fun doing it. it makes training him pretty easy. >> right. this is the fastest one, does he do other tricks? >> he snow boards and surfs, skim boards. he's pretty much amazing. >> this van behind you brings some talented dogs around. and who is in your arms? >> this is wally. the newest member of natural balance's skateboarding team of bulldogs and he's here for major league baseball's event, bark in the park which is this coming saturday, you can see tillman skateboarding, there's a parade.

>> what park? >> here in new york for the mets and it's a great event. you can bring your dog into the stadium and watch the game with them. >> get out of here. you don't have to have a dog that skate borboardskateboards. you have to have a dog. >> you have to have a dog. you have to love baseball and see tillman skateboard and meet these guys. it's amazing. >> can you imagine trying to bat and an irish wolf hound is going ballistic. >> yes, they have. there's a parade on the field and an amazing game and tillman. >> can't thank you enough. dick van patent has sponsored this and for you to bring these dogs down here and entertain, you have to see dr. oz even stuck around. that's how jealous he is in case of an injury. thank you very much. >> thank you so much. >> thank you very much for bringing them down. good job, norman. all right. and good job tillman. >> brian. >> tillman will not stop. >> brian? >> can you ask if norman sheds? >> does norman shed? >> yes, he does.

>> he does, gretch. but you know what? that's why they have vacuum cleaners. they have to make a living, too. >> he's so cute, though. >> all right. they both are. thanks so much. today is tax day and the president is talking about taxing the rich again. meantime, nearly half of all americans won't pay any taxes at all! at least on the federal level. peter johnson jr. up next with how we wound up in this mess. >> good. wait until you hear that story. don't let his small size fool you. this is one of the toughest we've met. coming up, meet the 7-year-old soldier. we'll explain. >> first, the trivia question of the day. [ male annouer ] is zero worth nothing?

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double dog dare you to try better-tasting than ever purina dog chow. we know your dog will love it. >> 45 minutes after the top of the hour. today, the on-line dating web site match.com announcing a plan to screen its users for sex offenders. the company responding to a lawsuit claiming it does not protect its users from on-line threats. just i guess may be blind but it's also forgiving if your judge is well fed. according to a new study. judges are less lenient before their meal break and more likely to cut you a break after they've had some food. very interesting. >> see you after lunch. tonight, midnight, the deadline to file your federal taxes and it's not easy to understand the tax code. there were over 4,000 changes to it in the last 10 years alone. that made us wonder how the heck did we get here? with a little trip down memory lane, peter johnson jr., our fox

news analyst joins us live. >> nice to see you. chief justice john marshall, the first justice in the supreme court said that the power to tax involves the power to destroy and throughout the 20th century and into the new century, we're finding out he may have been right in that very famous dictum he made in the case of mccullick vs. maryland. what you've seen now is there's been about 5,000 change to the tax code over the last decade. the tax code is burgeoned from 400 pages back to the beginning of the 20th century to like 65,000 or 70,000 pages now. >> are you kidding? >> i'm not kidding and what we know now is that it takes billions of dollars of man and woman hours to prepare and to pay those people to prepare and comply with taxes before we pay $0.01. >> no kidding. >> with regard to our taxes and the other problem is apart from

the confusion and the complexity is the $0.01 part. there's a lot of americans and a lot of companies like g.e. that don't pay $0.01. so on this tax day, people are saying where are we going? what have we done to ourselves? >> people out there are saying we need to have a fair tax or flat tax or something like that and there's some of the confusing tax codes, look at that. an estimated 579 changes this past year alone. >> 6.1 billion hours filing taxes. >> to show you how complex it is, here's a statement from the director. i.r.s., he was asked do you file your own taxes or use a preparer? i use a preparer. why? i've used one for years. i find it convenient and i find the tax code complex. and he's the guy who runs the enforcement of the tax code. >> that's what everybody faces and what everybody faces is this kind of disgust where we say that the median income

taxpayers, the people making $26,000 or $28,000 are paying a higher tax burden in this country than the people who are making a million dollars a day. and so representative ryan in this comprehensive plan that he's put together to cut more than $4 trillion in the deficit has said, listen, we don't want to reduce taxes, we want to make taxes fair. we want to cut out loopholes. we want to cut out the silly deductions. we want to make sure that the millionaires and billionaires and corporations pay their fair share of taxes while at the same time, we know that the 1% highest earners in this country and what's the number? they're paying 38% of the taxes at this point. so what we have on this tax day is confusion and what we have in this tax day is a white house that says if you don't pay more taxes, then you're not being patriotic. there's a lot of other americans and those americans who say the

opposite, that patriotism is paying less taxes, the government spending it better and our economy being more efficient going forward. got a lot to do in the coming months in washington to fix this mess. >> you have until midnight tonight to file your federal income tax. >> get er done, as they say. >> thank you very much, peter the cable guy. >> absolutely. >> next up on the rundown, the smallest soldier you're going to meet a 7-year-old training alongside our troops. how is that possible? details straight ahead. first, on this date in 1987, number one song in america was day nothing's gonna stop us by jefferson starship. vegetables have important vitamins and minerals that can really help protect you. and v8 juice gives you three of your five daily servings. powerful, right? v8. what's your number?

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>> answer to the tough question of the day.

kourtney kardashian. patrick didn't think it was tough. he's from philly. this guy is 7 years old but already dreaming big. he's battling muscular dystrophy and he had a wish to be a soldier for a day. guess what? his dream came true when the soldiers of fort riley's fourth infantry brigade, that is, combat team, they invited him to the ultimate army treatment. i'm joined now for the young command sergeant ian field and army's first sergeant brandon mcguire. good morning to you, gentlemen. >> good morning, ma'am. >> so sergeant mcguire, let me start with you. i know you were instrumental in facilitating this two-day visit that happened last week for ian. how did it all come about? >> well, the team contacted first infantry division and fourth brigade took the detail and we got together and started planning really how we could take a 20-year career and put it into two days. >> and you did just that. so you -- we've seen the video.

you taught him how to throw grenades and tell me some of the things that you taught ian. >> ian while he was with us got a chance to earn his expert infantryman badge and after that, got a chance to do some simulators where he got to fire multiple weapons, drive humvees and actually flew a blackhawk helicopter. he did some repelling. he actually stayed the night in the barracks with his squad that he was assigned to. >> right. >> and then it all concluded with an awards ceremony where he received all of his badges and awards for all the achievements he did. >> and ian, you are now command sergeant major? >> yeah. >> yeah. >> i know that this was a dream of yours, ian. why did you want to be a soldier? >> because it would be fun. >> because it would be fun. i was wondering how you compared ian, the barracks you slept in

to your bedroom at home. >> did you like the barracks? was it like your bedroom at home? >> yeah. >> yeah. >> what was your favorite memory, ian from those two days that you became a soldier? >> wednesday. >> what was your best time you had? while you were a soldier? rappelling. >> all right. sergeant mcguire, explain for us why this is important for you to be a part of. we mentioned earlier that ian does have muscular dystrophy. why was this important for you? >> well, it's very important for us because it's -- it's inspirational and it's humbling because we're soldiers every day and sometimes you -- it just becomes a daily grind. and here you have someone who wants nothing more to be a soldier and that's what we are

so it really makes you feel special inside. and makes you want to work a little harder every day. >> very well put. sergeant brandon mcguire, thanks for your time and for what you did for ian field. hats off to you, buddy. you're now a command sergeant major. congratulations. good to talk with both of you. >> thank you. >> well, you want to know exactly where your tax money goes? exactly what it pays for? i do. guess what? there's a way now. we'll show you how to do it. dana perino dishing out some advice for the donald. >> and you can't always be giving somebody a reason to vote against somebody else. you have to give them a reason to want to vote for you. >> the donald will react live right here on "fox & friends" next hour. ♪ hello sunshine, sweet as you can be ♪

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>> gretchen: good morning, everyone. today is monday, april 18 u 2011. i'm gretchen carlson. if you live in the south, you did not have is a good weekend. dozens of storms. nearly 250 tornadoes leaving a giant mess. >> steve: on the job naps are the best way to keep air traffic controllers from sleeping on the job. just one problem. >> controllers will not be paid to take naps. we want to make shower they're well rested. >> steve: that won't stop the energy secretary from shaking up the energy. what's in store? >> brian: donald trump blames president bush for putting president obama in office.

dana perino says bad move. >> you can't always be giving somebody a reason to vote against somebody else. you have to give them a reason to want to vote for you. >> brian: in 30 minutes, donald trump here to respond. "fox & friends" starts right now. >> steve: welcome aboard. live from studio e in the heart of midtown manhattan. our top story, residents from the south picking up the pieces after tornadoes ripped through their homes. at least 45 people were killed across six states. that death toll could go higher. rick has been covering the story all weekend and joins us now in north carolina. good morning to you, rick. >> good morning, steve. you said 45 fatalities across the country. 11 of those coming from this one county. it's in north carolina on the eastern side of north carolina

headed toward the outer banks, very sparsely populated county, around 21,000 people here. 11 fatalities from a very strong tornado that moved through. we've had a picture of this tornado that was taken by one of the members of this community as a tornado was coming in. around a half mile to three quarters of a mile wide is the estimate, likely an ef-3 tornado. this just one of the tornadoes here in north carolina. they're estimating that there were at least five ef-3 tornadoes. you rarely get ef-3 tornadoes under big storms, and certainly not across the eastern seaboard. those are the size you might see in oklahoma, across the plains. to get those here in north carolina, something that they don't see. in fact, this kind of a tornado outbreak likely going down as the largest tornado outbreak that they've ever seen in the state of north carolina. 62 reports of tornadoes just here. this is one of the homes. you can see the steps coming up to this home. then you just have the structure. the home completely lifted off of its base and moved back into

the woods and obliterated, torn into pieces. there were three fatalities from this home right here. you can see back in the distance, different structures that have been destroyed. they're still standing, wood structures, roofs blown off, paint peeled off of buildings and everything completely in shambles across this entire area. it will be a very long time for people in this community to recover from it. most of these people born in this community, still live here and now they're going to have to try to figure out exactly how do you clean this up and when you have such a small community sit so hard and is devastating for them. >> steve: we were there over the weekend on saturday night when they hit. that area is used to hurricanes. they're not used to tornadoes. >> yeah. i said it. a lot of people commenting on that. they deal with hurricane, they're prepared for that. they might occasionally get a small tornado that comes from a hurricane, but nothing this

size. >> steve: all right. rick in north carolina. thank you. >> brian: the faa putting new rules in place for air traffic controllers after seven of them were caught asleep on the job. joiningity now from orlando international airport, local bristow of our afill gait. >> good morning. i spoke with a lot of folks here and a lot of them were absolutely shocked to learn that up to now, they only had to have eight hours off between shifts. starting this morning, they bumped that up an hour and have to have nine hours off between their scheduled shifts. this comes after seven incidents this year where an air traffic controller has fallen asleep while on duty. the most recent incident happened just over the weekend, saturday, in miami. the faa is reporting an air traffic controller at a regional radar facility which coordinates high altitude flying over much of florida, the atlantic ocean and surrounding caribbean dozed off before 5:00 o'clock in the

morning. he didn't miss any calls, which did prove to be an issue in other recent incidents. industry insiders say those falling asleep on overnight shift be has been a problem for decades. so say the remedy would be to schedule naps. ray lahood said they will not be paid for naps. germany and japan actually have quiet rooms in their airports where air traffic controllers can schedule nap time while they're on shifts. obviously it doesn't look like anything that will be happening here in the u.s. any time soon. >> brian: wow. thank you very much. let's talk about what the president will be talking about. that is his tour. it's called the shared responsibility tour because the for nate had it too good for too long. >> gretchen: you have to wonder whether or not this was going to be his campaign platform had it not been for so much talk during the recent weeks, especially paul ryan coming out with his plan and the president almost

forced into a response last week. now this is his campaign speech. this is going to be what it's about, the shared responsibility. tim geithner, his treasury secretary, echoed some of the same sentiments you'll hear from the president. >> you want to extend these tax breaks for the top 2%, then either you have to ask me to go out and borrow trillions of dollars from the chinese or from foreign investors or from our children or you have to cut as he proposes to do, very, very deeply into basic benefits for seniors, the disabled, the poor. >> steve: so essentially it sounds like class warfare by the treasury secretary. so the president is setting out on this tour through the balance of this week. he's going to start at nova, outside washington, d.c. in northern virginia, then as we look at the little map and we've got air force one going to travel over to facebook headquarters in palo alto and reno. we had dana perino on and she was talking about doesn't this kind of look like a campaign

trip, in which case the campaign would have to pay for it, unless it's official presidential business, in which case we would pay for it. >> brian: i don't think money is the issue because he's going to raise a billion dollars, he can afford it. but overall, with a year and a half until we have a presidential race, i think that the president would be engaged, feel comfortable enough to engage with the house, with the senate, and come up with a plan. i didn't know -- >> steve: he's campaigning. >> brian: november of 2012. >> gretchen: what you're intimating is that he's putting his debt reduction plan now on the gang of six, prodding them to come in with something and he'll swoop in at the end, which has been his m.o. and said we all came to this agreement. >> brian: i didn't think there was any reason for the white house to be here and congressman ryan to be here when they all identified the entitlements as the problem. remember when he was up against the president when they were saying, you are cutting 36 billion out of discretionary spending. why don't you do it on

nondiscretionary spending. so he does that and he says, what are you doing? >> gretchen: unfortunately when you make some of those tough decisions, you don't get reelected. so that may be why president obama does not want to stick his whole hand into the equation. just a sing. >> brian: if -- finger. >> brian: if you look what mario cuomo's son did, mitch daniels came back after initial hard cuts. so they tend to bounce back and he had enough time to make it. >> gretchen: we'll continue to debate this throughout the week. we have other headlines. that deadly storm system wreaking havoc on parts of the northeast four-inches of rain in new jersey. six rivers in the state now at flood stage level. five people, including two children and a four-month old baby, dead after their suv slipped off the road and sank in a canal. it happened at a national park in north carolina.

investigators say the 24-year-old woman who was driving the car was going too fast. the deadly storms that slammed that state over the weekend reportedly not a factor in this accident. a remote controlled digging machine brought in to find a miner trapped in idaho since friday. the miner and his brother were working 6,000 feet below the surface when the tunnel collapsed on them. the brother did manage to escape. the special digger will be brought underground in pieces. it will be put together a mile below the surface. hate to tell you this, but it's tax day. that means you have until midnight to file your taxes. it also means that the tea party is out in force today. there were rallies across the weekend calling for lower taxes and smaller government. sarah palin leading the charge in wisconsin. those are your headlines for a moon. >> steve: straight ahead, donald trump's latest comments could cost him. >> whether you like him or not, george bush gave us obama. >> steve: okay. but former bush insiders say

being mistake. donald trump is here to address this. >> brian: want to know exactly how your tax money gets spent dollar by dollar. one congressman will explain after the break. delicious gourmet of gravy. and she agrees. with fancy fest gravy lovers, your cat can enjoy the delicious, satisfying taste of gourmet gravy every d. fay feast, the best ingredient is love.

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and get the 2011 tiguan for $279 a month. visit vwdealer.com today. >> steve: welcome back. each year, americans fork over billions of dollars in federal taxes. if you wonder where all that money goes, you're not alone. now perhaps you could get a receipt from the white house. but our next guest wants to make sure you know where every penny goes. here to explain is jim mcdermott. thank you for getting up so early in the home of the space needle. >> good morning. >> steve: you reintroduced on april 15th the taxpayer receipt act. what would that do?

>> that would put into law requirement that every year, people would receive a statement, a receipt from the government for the money that they have paid in taxes and they would be told in what categories that money was spent, whether it was spent for social security or for defense or for the environment or for education or for whatever. we wanted to use apolitical things. we want people to have actual information because one of the interesting things about this debate we're now having about the budget is 60% of the people in the united states think that between 20 and 30% of our money goes to foreign aid, when, in fact, the foreign aid part of the budget is less than 1 1/2 of 1%. so we think the transparency in giving people information will make the debate much more sensible because at least people will be arguing about the same set of facts.

>> steve: sure. it's like the old saying, follow the money, that way you can see how much goes to social security, you can see how much is going to the wars in afghanistan and wherever else we're involved in military conflict. so you would get that statement like once a year from the federal government if your bill were approved. what about for the 45% of americans who don't pay federal income tax? >> well, they would not be a part of the debate because if your circumstances are such that you're not paying taxes, there is no -- we have no way to get to you, we're not just going to send it out all over the place because the people who are debating here are the people who are paying taxes by and large. and they're the ones who are complaining and thinking that too much is being spent here or too much there and we thought that it was important, especially as we talk about a budget, in which there is going to be a discussion about what should be cut. the people understand what proportion of the budget that

each part of the budget plays, so the people understand you can't do it all by cutting out things in the national parks or in the libraries or things like that. there are big categories you would kind of go after. >> steve: sure. one of the things the president, listening to him last week, what he would be going after is the rich, the most successful people in the country. he would really like to increase the amount of taxes they pay. he's kicking off his shared responsibility and prosperity tour. going to be out in the west coast. here i want your reaction, but first here is one of your colleagues from wisconsin, paul ryan, on his reaction to any tax increase right now. >> raising tax rates on anybody, especially successful small businesses slows down the economy, loses jobs, and if you have lower economic growth, you have less revenues and it puts you further behind. we want more tax revenues, but we want to get it by expanding job creation, by expanding

economic growth. >> steve: i think you would like to say that you would like to expand job growth as well, but do you think that one good way to close a budget gap is to, you know, soak the rich? >> well, certainly everybody should pay their fair share and for people to be making a quarter of a million dollars or more or millionaires millionaire and getting a tax break in a time like this makes no sense. we need the money to invest not only in education, but also infrastructure. if a bridge falls down and the government has no money to rebuild it, we not only don't have the infrastructure, we don't have the jobs. so in many ways, you have to look at the people at the top who are by and large doing okay. if you're getting a million dollars a year in income, you're not in very much trouble and you can pay something to help the country make it. >> steve: all right. interesting stuff. congressman jim mcdermott, democrat from the great state of washington, thank you for

getting up so early for us. >> my pleasure. >> steve: straight ahead on our telecast on this monday, rescued from beneath the rubble, coming up, the youngest and smallest survivors from this weekend's terrible tornadoes. plus, marrying into the monarchy, very different for these two women. an up close look at the stark differences between diana and kate. [ male announcer ] i know what you're thinking -- leather trim command center, aost 300 horsepower, infinity surround sound, seating for seven. wait. this a minivan? makes you almost want to have kids. [ ild screams ] almost.

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>> brian: time for your headlines. new york is the newest member of an exclusive club. four-dollar a gallon gasoline now, according to a triple a,

the empire state joins california, alaska, illinois, connecticut, hawaii, and washington, d.c in texas, wild fires forcing hundreds from their homes. more high winds expected today. the flames scorching nearly 250 homes overall. a man was arrested for allegedly starting the camp fire that strayed eight of those homes. >> gretchen: the royal wedding two weeks away, the comparisons between princess diana's we hadding and kate middleton's upcoming wedding increasing. we wanted to take a closer look at how day i can't in a's legacy will impact both kate's marriage and the monarchy. christopher anderson is the author of "william and kate" and joins me from hartford, connecticut. good morning. >> good morning. >> gretchen: let's start with the dating. let's go way back. diana dated less than six months, prince charles. a little different with kate and william. right? >> yeah. you remember shy di? here is this young woman, aristocratic family, nursery school teacher, broken home, fragile person, and suddenly

she's thrust into the limelight and she gets married six months later. at 19 when she gets engaged. 20 when she gets married. the contrast with kate, it's so striking. kate, not only her whole background is different. she's a commoner, her parents were married for 30 years, solid background, emotionally really stable, and she has nine years with this guy before they've decided to tie the knot. all that time, she's under the media scrutiny and stands up well. so right there you've got the scene set for the different marriages. >> gretchen: let's talk about the wedding date. diana's was july 29, 1981. and kate's is going to be april 29, 2011. what do you make of that? >> well, i mean, not much really. they wanted to have a summer wedding. what i think is fascinating about kate having this marriage happen in april is that she will be 29 years old and he'll still be 28. >> gretchen: all right!

>> my wife would never have gone for that. but i guess she decided to go ahead with it. the nature of the wedding will be so different, they want it to be a people's wedding and diana's wasn't. she had 3500 people there. they were heads of state and government, all royals from all the various houses of europe. in this particular wedding, you've got 100 people selected at random. it would never have happened with diana. >> gretchen: you mentioned the difference in the guest number, 3900 to 1900. here is the controversial thing. the tiara. diana wore one. she probably would have done anything that anyone said because she was so young and didn't know really what was going on, unfortunately. reportedly kate middleton does not want to wear one. will this ruffle the feathers? >> first of all, that tiara that diana war was a spencer one. it was in her family. it was so heavy, it gave diana a gigantic headache all day long, a migraine. and william told that to kate,

so kate is not going to do that. >> gretchen: and diana seeing camilla in the seats and knowing charles loved her. >> he knew charles had given camilla this bracelet the night before her wedding. it was devastating. she said i walked by and there was camilla and inn a great pill box hat with her son standing on the chair beside her. she remembered it in great detail. >> gretchen: kind of sad. all right. hopefully this will be a different thing. christopher anderson, great to pick your brain on the royals. thank you so much. >> thank you. >> gretchen: we'll be covering the royal wedding starting april 27 over in london. i'll be joining you from there for those three days. coming up on our show, karl rove calling outside donald trump. >> the american people will not be hiring him and the republican people will not in the primary. >> gretchen: the donald will respond to his critics right

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something that was drilled in me early on, you know, college is the place for you. it's my number o goal. ♪ students like me, who take these ap math and science classes and have these opportunities, this is where the american dream lies. when i write that book, you know, i plan to dedica it to my school. ♪ those hopes and dreams that you have, you know, they're within reach. and i'm living proof. >> steve: take a look. a live look at damage in raleigh, north carolina, homes turned in big piles of rubble

and knocked off their foundations from the deadliest storm system that slammed the south, killing at least 45 people in six days. you're looking at live pictures of the devastation in north carolina of the one family snapped this photo which has been seen everywhere, of the tornado seconds before it ripped apart their neighbor's home. damage might be done, but the community still shaken up. >> the landscape in the structure here will never, never be the same, but the loss of lives here is the one thing that we can never replace. >> steve: absolutely. a glimmer of hope in this horrible mess, these three puppies rescued in the debris in sanford, north carolina, their owner naming them lucky, miracle, and twister. >> brian: 30 minutes now to the top of the hour. president obama is playing deal or no deal with republican leaders today. he's trying to get the gop on board with his plan to raise the government's debt limit. steve centanni live outside the

white house with the latest. >> good morning. the president hits the road this week to promote his vision of debt and deficit reduction and this morning he is promoting one of those upcoming appearances on facebook. >> hi, everybody. i just want to take a minute to invite you to a town hall meeting on the economy that i'm holding at facebook's headquarters this wednesday, april 20. >> wednesday, the president heads to to the west coast for a stop at the facebook headquarters. it will be his first trip since chicago last week when he was heard on an open mic criticizing paul ryan for vote ago variety of spending measures that weren't paid for. ryan responded over the weekend. >> there was plenty of time for him to do campaigning later. right now we got things to do. so i think it would be more productive if we put the campaign rhetoric aside and get on to focusing on treating each other with respect. >> ryan says he does not want

the u.s. government to default and says the debt ceiling needs to be increased later this spring, but the republicans won't rubber stamp a debt increase. meantime, the treasury secretary says he's heard the republicans promise the president the debt ceiling will be raised. >> we're a country that meets its obligations and we have to meet our obligations and they recognize that. i heard the leadership tell the president that again on wednesday. >> and that debate on raising the debt ceiling won't begin until congress comes back from their two-week break in early may. back to you guys. >> gretchen: steve centanni on a relatively quiet day. usually we hear something going on in the background. thanks inasmuch very shortly, the president will be traveling out west, going to start in virginia, then facebook headquarters, and then reno. >> brian: i thought it was amazing that timothy geithner said i talked to republican leaders and they're going to raise the debt ceiling and they said, what are you talking about? not only that, it would play

their trump card. >> gretchen: donald trump, i hope he's ready to go because on mondays, this is his time slot with us on the phone. good morning to you, donald. >> good morning. >> gretchen: so we got a lot to talk about. >> a lot. >> gretchen: because just the other day, you did an interview where you said, hey, i'm friendly with all the other gop guys and gals out there who may run for president. and then you sort of took a swipe at mitt romney. let's listen. >> mitt romney is a basically small business guy. if you really think about it. i mean, my net worth is many, many, many times mitt romney. and i don't know mitt romney. i really don't know him, so i'm not saying good or bad. i know some of the other candidates. i don't know mitt romney. >> gretchen: small business owner, donald? >> i don't think it was a swipe. the question was in terms of business. i'm a much bigger business person. i'm worth a lot of money, many, many, many billions of dollars. i have employed hundreds of thousands of people over the

years and really jobs that i created and mitt was involved with a fund and i think it's great. i'm not saying anything bad about that. i think it's wonderful. but the question was really how do you compare in terms of size? and i think i'm much more important business person. >> gretchen: all right. are you changing your tactic because most of the polls have shown that romney is in the lead? >> no, i think it's just the opposite. i'm so surprised at that question. public polling came out that had me 11 points up on romney. i'm surprised by that question actually. i think that a lot of people actually, governor huckabee was ahead of romney. i think one of the problems, you're going to get to karl rove probably because he's one of your roving people, but one of the problems that rove has is that he's devastated, i understand, that romney is doing so badly. and he took a shot at me the other day, which was disgraceful, but he is devastated by the fact that romney is doing so poorly. >> brian: here is karl rove on your candidacy which has you up in front with the public poll

poll has you in a comfortable first place lead. let's listen. >> i'm shocked. the guy is smarter than this and the idea that president obama was not born in hawaii, making that the centerpiece of this campaign means that now he's a joke candidate. let him announce for election on the apprentice. the american people are not going to be hiring him and certainly the republicans are not going to be hiring him in the primary. >> brian: he was upset by the birther stuff and he was upset by -- i don't know. i guess that when you were saying that. >> i think he's upset by the fact that his candidate is doing so poorly. but also the birth certificate is a big deal to people. i made a speech this weekend, i mentioned birth certificate, they went wild! there is a big question as to where he was born, there is a big question about the birth certificate. and frankly, karl rove got more publicity from this than he has on anything for a while. but really probably what bothers

karl and i understand this and i can fully understand this, i am very upset with bush because bush had a really bad period of time and he gave us obama. and karl rove was bush. i mean, you know, a lot of people say karl rove was bush. so he can't love me. i don't expect that he's going to love me. but bush gave us obama. in all fairness to john mccain and sarah palin, nobody could have won. they could have brought back abraham lincoln, he couldn't have beaten obama because of what karl and bush had done. >> gretchen: this whole birther thing, i'm trying to fast forward, let's say the people you have investigating, are they still investigating? >> i don't want to comment on that, but i can tell you there are a lot of problems with this. he does not have, he has not given a birth certificate. you know what? i wish he would. i'll give you an example. this weekend -- >> steve: he could end it, just show it to us. >> just show us birth

certificate! thank you very much, steve, i appreciate that. just show us birth certificate. is he trying to torture the american public? just show us. this weekend i was in an airplane. the pilot came back to see me. he said, mr. trump, could i speak to you? yes. my friends and myself want to thank you for bringing up this whole birth certificate, sir. we really appreciate it. please don't give it up. please don't give it up. then karl rove takes a cheap shot at me? that's ridiculous. >> gretchen: the thing is, when you run for president, these are issues that are getting a lot of attention now with the voters. but you're also going to have to have a plan and part of it's going to have to to be some good news in policy. here is what dana perino said. she was giving you some advice. >> donald trump is serious about running, one of the things he's going to have to do is start to pivot because people want to know what the positive agenda would be for america. and you can't always be giving somebody a reason to vote against somebody else. you have to give them a reason to want to vote for you. >> steve: all right. >> first of all, i know dana are

are -- dana perino dane and think she's great. it's a headline grabber and folks like rove grab it for themselves. but it's the least. i talk about china, how they're ripping us off. i talk about opec. you're going to have 7-dollar oil, $8 gasoline. prices are going in terms of this country, $150 a barrel very soon and the country cannot just soon there. >> brian: for example, that is absolutely relevant. here is something else. we have the president of the united states come forward and say the fortunate, the rich should pay more. i want to know how you feel about that. >> you can't take away incentive because the rich can leave and they will leave and lots of other things could happen. you have to create incentives for jobs and people are understanding it and i was actually surprised to see one of your polls where the public, the general public feels 50/50 on

this issue. i was actually surprised at people to understand it. you need to create incentives to create jobs. very important. but in terms of centerpiece, my centerpiece is to bring jobs back to this country and this is what i'm the best at. i've employed hundreds of thousands of people and created hundreds of thousands of jobs over the years and created tremendous wealth for people and for families and health care and education for these families and something i'm really good at. that's really the centerpiece of what i'm talking about. but also i don't want and it will never happen if i run and if i win, it will never happen where the world is ripping off our country. >> gretchen: all right, donald. you're more fired up than usual this morning. that's why you're a great guest and why you join us every monday. we will chat with you again. >> okay. thank you. >> gretchen: thanks so much. >> steve: straight ahead, the chairman of the republican national committee here right after the break to weigh in on what the donald just reported to

us. >> gretchen: nick, new video shows what happened before he was bustd in new orleans. we make meeting times, lunch times and conference times. but wha'd rather making are t times. tee times are the official start of what we love to do.

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five flavors of chex are gluten-free, including the honey nut flavor, and that's amazing to a mom like me. as a parent you don't want to have to tell your kids "no" all the time. it's nice for me to be able to say "yes" to something that they want to eat. [ male announcer ] chex cereal. five flavors. gluten free. >> gretchen: quick headlines. >> brian: volkswagen revamping the beetle. the new model unveiled moments ago has a flat roof. no word yet on the price tag. the new video of nicholas cage. just before his arrest in the big easy, tmz released video showing cage arguing with his wife, with friends at a tattoo parlor. friends say he likely is headed for rehab. he was daring them to arrest him. so they did. guess who bailed him out? dog chapman. 11,000 bucks. >> gretchen: wow. we just heard from donald trump who is looking more and more

like a rincon tender -- republican contender. reince previn joins us. good morning to you. >> good morning, how are you? >> steve: doing okay. dropped trump -- donald trump was on a couple weeks ago and said you had spoken to him on the phone, talking about stuff? >> sure. i mean, i talked to mr. trump and it was a good conversation. it was all positive and good. >> gretchen: what about now based on some of the things that he has said since that phone conversation, he's really ratcheted up carolina and the rest of the country to make a decision and then i'm going to support that

candidate. so my reaction to it, all generally, though, is that the news media picks up on a sound bite here and there and creates a story out of it and then we have many controversies. but i think these are all issues that candidates will talk about and primary voters will decide. i don't pick the candidates and obviously my job -- is not to get in the middle of it. >> brian: when chairman ryan came out with his plan to get rid of the debt, 6 trillion at a time, he said we got to revamp medicaid and revamp medicare as well as social security. so in the big picture, are you concerned that congressman ryan doing this has allowed president obama to put the republican party, your party, in a box that says they want to hurt the poor, they want to hurt those who need the entitlement programs and don't pay their fair share? >> no. i don't at all. i think what he's done is he's put our party in the lead. we've shown i think leadership to the american people that when you have medicare and i think

people understand this -- medicare, social security, medicaid, these are government promises that everybody, republicans and democrats alike, knows that these are promises the government can't keep. medicare will go bankrupt in nine years by doing nothing, which is what the president wants to do, which is nothing. so we're taking the lead and we're doing something about it before our country walks off of a fiscal cliff. this is, i think, what the american people want, which is they want solutions to our problems and these entitles are a problem. so is the debt and the deficit. >> steve: all right. chairman, tell us about a contest you're having where people can apparently submit videos on why americans can't afford another four years of obama. >> sure. you know that we need to do not only good job, but better job in our new media outreach to our supporters and grassroots. so what we're doing is engaging

our grassroot supporters and people across the country to send us a 30 second video through youtube and tell us why they can't afford four more years of barak obama and i think this is a great way to engage people in this country and also a great way for us to learn from everyone out in the country to what it is that's on their minds and what things that we could be touching on to make a better case to the american people. >> gretchen: it's also reaching out to the younger demographic, which is something the democrats did so well the last time around. thanks so much for being a guest. we did invite the newly selected dnc chairman to join, but she declined. good to see you. >> brian: she's eligible to put a 30 second spot together. >> steve: she may not win. >> gretchen: he's only nine. wait until you hear what he's doing all because of "fox & friends." >> steve: first, let's check in with ali with what happens in 12 1/2 minutes. >> great to see you. as you know, there was unthinkable death and damage

caused by the outbreak of tornadoes. we're live in north carolina with one man who was in the storm's path and you'll hear how he saved his young daughter. then there is a new bipartisan plan to cut the budget and even its authors say no one will like it. brit hume will be here to explain why. we'll also have the latest for you in the holly vogel abduction says. bill and i will see you then. after an alpaca? i have. it was awesome. ♪ call 1-800-steemer you gotta try honey bunches of oats with almonds! it's got real, sliced california almonds with a third less sugar per serving than honey nut cheerios. wow! delicious! try honey bunches of oats with almonds!

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>> gretchen: this story will warm your heart. this little boy in the middle may only be nine years old, but he has a huge heart. two years ago he asked his friends to donate money to charity instead of buying him birthday gifts. joining us from austin, texas is this family. good morning to all three of you. >> good morning. >> gretchen: little gary, that happened two years ago. the first time you decided not

to get birthday gifts. what did you decide to do this year for your birthday? >> i decided to give to the march of dimes. >> gretchen: and how did you pick them? >> my dad saw this person won an award for the march of dimes. >> gretchen: you thought that would be a good charity for you to be involved with because you say you want to do help children who were sick. >> yes, ma'am. >> gretchen: reverend brown, i know that i received this letter from you. i was blown away that your son had this kind of compassion within him. but then also in this beautiful letter that he wrote to me, saying i inspired him, he sent me these checks. you helped him collect $500 for the march of dimes from his friends? >> right. his friends, instead of buying him gifts, they donated him the money this year and last year

and then some other people bought gifts for him and so what i did was we took the value of the gift and let him keep the gifts and we put the money in there so we can come to $500 to give to the march of dimes. >> gretchen: audrey, this is such a struggle for parents. i have two little kids as well and the amount of gifts that they can receive it sometimes seems overwhelming. is that how you came up with this idea with your son and what kind of lessons are you trying to teach him? >> gretchen, you are so correct. in the past we were so overwhelmed with the amount of gifts that he had received and we knew that he definitely did not need all of those gifts. what we immediately did was sat down and talked with him and this was a lesson that we've taught him all the time in the home and throughout church about giving, you know, to be a blessing to other people, and we thought about people who were in a much greater need than what we were. so we decided to ask for donations in lieu of the gifts.

we just wanted to be a blessing to other people who were in need. >> gretchen: gary, what was the reaction from your friends when you said, hey, i don't want any toys. just bring me a check for charity? >> oh, my gosh, i can't believe it! >> gretchen: and? >> brian: he told them the kids said, i can't believe you don't want any gifts for your birthday. >> gretchen: but then they all sent their checks. we have denominations here of $15, 15, 15 more. then i know reverend, did you make up the difference to get to 500 or how did that happen? >> no. we took -- in order to get it up there to you, we just wrote a check for the cash that we had. i think i ended up putting in like 100 something. but our goal was 500. both years i made sure it's 500. i'll make it up. >> gretchen: you made your goal. i just -- we have a special surprise coming up right after this break. before i go, little gary, i got to tell you, what a fantastic

student you are. i'm holding up your report card, you're a straight a student, thank you for sending me your report card, too. >> thank you. >> gretchen: all right. i guess he's learning all of life's good lessons. we have a big surprise coming up right after the break. reverend brown, audrey and gary, if you can stick around. right back for that. can you enjoy vegetables with sauce and still reach your weight loss goals? you can with green giant frozen vegetables. over twenty delicious varieties have sixty calories or less per serving and are now weight watchers-endorsed. try green giant frozen vegetables with uce. if you have painful, swollen joints, i've been in your shoes.

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i wear what i love, because expression means everything. i wear the pants. and the tops. and the jewels. i grab life by the accessories. some say i've done it all. i say just getting started. ♪ too hot to trot ♪ baby i'm so chico's. >> gretchen: we're back with gary brown and his parents. gary decided to collect money for the march of dimes instead of getting any gifts or toys for his birthday this year. also joining us now is carol evans, the vice chair of the march of dimes and president of working mother media. we have a special presentation for you. gary, i wish you were here to do this yourself. but i'm going to do it for you. is that okay? >> yes. >> gretchen: all right. these are the checks, carol, that gary collected from his friends. his goal was $500, of which he accomplished this goes to the

march of dimes. >> gary, this is so wonderful! this is so important for the babies of america. march of dimes is so proud of you and there are 900 walks, marches all across the country over the next two weeks. so this money is going to be donated to the march for babies right through march for babies.org. >> gretchen: i know you wanted to say what a wonderful example you think gary is for other children and adults watching frankly. >> also your parents. i have to say, it's so wonderful to see this kind of role modeling not only from the child, but from the parents as well. we are so proud of you and the work that you've done and giving up your birthday presents, that must have been kind of hard. although i guess he's got a few. that's really nice. these are presents for babies. the babies really, really thank you and your wonderful family, gary. >> you're welcome. >> gretchen: all right. to reverend gary brown, audrey and little gary brown, thanks so much for joining us today. and to carol evans, we will continue this discussionth